All Things Semiconductor!
eFPGA stands for embedded Field Programmable Grid Arrays. An eFPGA is a programmable device like an FPGA but rather than being sold as a completed chip it is licensed as a semiconductor IP block. ASIC designers can license this IP and embed it into their own chips adding the flexibility of programmability at an incremental cost.… Read More
Achronix has taken a long, circuitous, and ultimately very successful path to becoming a successful semiconductor device and IP company. This chapter describes the company’s development path from the initial idea to develop the world’s highest-performance FPGA using asynchronous logic to the company’s current role as the… Read More
Why does it seem like current FPGA devices work very much like the original telephone systems with exchanges where workers connected calls using cords and plugs? Achronix thinks it is now time to jettison Switch Blocks and adopt a new approach. Their motivation is to improve the suitability of FPGAs to machine learning applications,… Read More
Dr. Cheng Wang, Co-Founder and SVP Engineering at Flex Logix, presented the second talk in the ‘AI at the Edge’ session, at the just concluded Linley Spring Processor Conference, highlighting the InferX X1 Inference Co-Processor’s high throughout, low cost, and low power. He opened by pointing out that existing inference solutions… Read More
The basic principles used for neural networks have been understood for decades, what have changed to make them so successful in recent years are increased processing power, storage and training data. Layered on top of this is continued improvement in algorithms, often enabled by dramatic hardware performance improvements.… Read More
In 2015 Intel acquired Altera for $16.7B changing one of the most heated rivalries (Xilinx vs Altera) the fabless semiconductor ecosystem has ever seen. Prior to the acquisition the FPGA market was fairly evenly split between Xilinx and Altera with Lattice and Actel playing to market niches in the shadows. There were also two FPGA… Read More
During 2018, Menta looked quiet if you consider communication as the main indicator of activity. In fact, the eFPGA vendor was hyper-active in developing future business and reports two main design-win. The first is with the European Processor Initiative (EPI) and Menta has announced in December 2018 that it has been selected… Read More
Cryptocurrencies represent a radical departure from traditional forms of money. Currencies like Bitcoin, Etherium and Monero offer many unique advantages over traditional currencies, and are changing how money is created and used. Bitcoin, the pioneer of cryptocurrencies, relies on pure computational power for so-called… Read More
Ever since we replaced horses in our personal transportation system, folks have been pining for cars that offer some relief from the constant need for supervision, control and management. Indeed, despite their obvious downsides, horses could be counted on to help with steering and obstacle avoidance. There are even cases when… Read More
Frequent Semiwiki readers are well aware of the industry momentum behind machine learning applications. New opportunities are emerging at a rapid pace. High-level programming language semantics and compilers to capture and simulate neural network models have been developed to enhance developer productivity (link). Researchers… Read More
eFPGA – “What a great idea! But I have no idea how I’d use it!”
Ensuring System-level Security Through Hardware/Software Security Verification
REPLAY: Fabless: The Transformation of the Semiconductor Industry
The Brave New World of Customized Memory
Embedded FPGA: The Fabric for Optimized Machine Learning
VLSI Design Methodology Development
Desinging Complex SoCs and Dealing with Multiple File Formats?
How ASIC/SoC Prototyping Solutions Can Help You!
Flexible, Multiprotocol IO’s in 7nm FinFets
REPLAY: GPU-Powered SPICE: The Way Forward for Analog Simulation
